Born September 15, 1890 in Torquay, UK, Agatha Christie started her writing journey, becoming one of the most well known mystery authors in history. Christie has written 66 books and 14 short stories throughout her career and has sold over 2 billion English copies and another 200 million in 40 different languages. She is not only known for having 66 books, but for also creating the longest running play, Mouse Trap, at 2 hours and 20 minutes.
Christie started her writing career at the age of 13 after writing a short story for her friend, who had just lost her cat. That led her to publishing her first novel, The Mysterious Affairs at Styles, in October 1920. From then on, Christie was known as the Queen of Crime.
Agatha Christie, however, was not very well known at the time, because she wrote under a pseudonym, Mary Westmancott. She would have continued to write under that name if a journalist hadn’t revealed her true identity in 1949.
Most of Christie’s popular and famous stories revolve around two characters, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, who each are detectives in her mystery novels. Since Christie is a mystery/crime writer, quite a bit of her novel victims were killed by poison, as she had extensive knowledge she gathered during her time working at a hospital during World War 1.
Agatha Christie had two husbands in her lifetime. Archibald Christie was her first husband, they married in 1914 and divorced in 1928. Christie’s only child, Rosalind Hicks, was from their marriage. During the Christies’ divorce she wrote some of her world renowned novels. Her second husband, Max Mallowan, who was an archaeologist, was with Christie until the end of his life.
Christie has over 20 plays based on her novels. Some of the most popular ones are Murder on The Orient Express, The ABC Murders, And Then There Were None, Five Little Pigs, and Crooked House. She has also had many movies made based on her books. The most recent ones being from 2022 and 2023 called, Death on the Nile and A Haunting in Venice. And Then There Were None was also her best selling novel.
Sadly the games had to end. Agatha Christie passed away on January 12, 1976. Even though it has been almost half a century since her death, Agatha Christie’s works continue to live on and influence casal readers and mystery fanatics alike.
